Alert Bay earns shot at Breeders' Cup Mile

ARCADIA, Calif. - Enough of this conquering stakes up and down the West Coast.

Alert Bay, the winner of Sunday’s $200,750 City of Hope Mile at Santa Anita, is bound for Kentucky and the Breeders’ Cup Mile at Keeneland on Oct. 31.

“This race should let us look at that,” said trainer Blaine Wright. “He wasn’t blowing too hard.”

Alert Bay ($10.80) closed from fifth of eight to win the Grade 2 City of Hope Mile by a length over 18-1 pacesetter Big Cazanova. Avanzare, the 8-5 favorite, and the winner of the Grade 2 Del Mar Mile in August, finished third.

Alert Bay ran a mile on turf in 1:33.58.

Ridden for the first time by Martin Garcia, Alert Bay rallied wide in early stretch to be second by a length to Big Cazanova with a furlong to go. Alert Bay finished well to score the eighth stakes win of his career.

Alert Bay won five consecutive stakes from September 2014 to late January, a span that included the Grade 2 Mathis Brothers Mile for 3-year-olds here last December.

Alert Bay returned to racing in June after a break of more than four months. He lost his first three starts, a span that included a third in the Grade 3 Longacres Mile at Emerald Downs on Aug. 16. Alert Bay won the Rolling Green Stakes at Golden Gate Fields on Sept. 7 as a prep for the City of Hope Mile.

“I think he’s just getting good again,” Wright said.

Owned by Peter Redekop, Alert Bay has won 10 of 19 starts and earned $954,495. He has won stakes at Hastings, Golden Gate Fields, and Santa Anita on the West Coast and at Zia Park in New Mexico in his career.

A start in the BC Mile would be the first in a Grade 1 for Alert Bay, a California-bred by City Zip.

The field for the City of Hope Stakes was reduced to eight starters after Twentytwentyvision was scratched at the gate. Trainer Richard Mandella said Twentytwentyvision got his head stuck in the front of the gate and suffered a severe cut to a lip.

A half-hour after the race, Twentytwentyvision was receiving veterinary care at Mandella’s stable to close a wound on his lip, Mandella said.